IBISES. 



159 



Nile as tlie ibis, being generally pointed out to travelers by dragomans, etc., as the 

 real Ibis reliffiosa." This is due to the fact that the " sacred ibis," to quote Mr. D. 

 G. Elliot's words, " is no longer met with u])on the NHe north of Khartum, and I do not 

 know of any authentic account of its having been seen in Egypt in modern times;" and 

 Dr. A. L. Adams finds " no reason for considering the sacred ibis to have been a 

 native at any time of either Egypt or Nubia." A few straggling individuals to 

 lower Egyi)t have, however, been recently reported. The latter author continues as 

 follows: " No doubt it was imported by the ancient Egyptians; and judging from 

 the numbei's which are constantly turning up in the tombs and pits of Sakkara and 



FlO. T7, — Ibis ctthiopica, sacred ibis. 



elsewhere in Egyjit, and the accounts of Herodotus, Diodorus, Strabo, etc., the ibis 

 must have been very numerous, and, like the brahmin bull in India, 'did as it choosed.' 

 The last-named writer says, ' every street in Ale.vandria is full of them. In certain 

 resjjects they are useful, in others troublesome. Tiicy are useful because they jiick 

 up all sorts of small animals, .in<l the offal thrown out of the butchers' and cooks' 

 shops. They are troublesome because they devour everything, are ilirty, and with 

 difficulty prevented from polluting in every way what is clean, and wh;it is not given 

 to them.' The late Mr. Khind informed me that he found several jars of white eggs, 

 as large as a mallard's, along with many embalmed bodies of ibises, at Thebe.s. 

 Mummied ibises are usually found alone, but sometimes with the sacred animals ; and 



